


Words On The Backs Of Our Hands

by icarus_chained



Category: The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Artificial Intelligence, Family, Friendship, Gen, Grief/Mourning
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-08-29
Updated: 2012-08-29
Packaged: 2017-11-13 04:01:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,504
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/499235
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/icarus_chained/pseuds/icarus_chained
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tony, Thor, Dummy and JARVIS. Handshakes and secrets and the teaching of precious things.</p><p>Stand-alone fic.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Words On The Backs Of Our Hands

**Author's Note:**

> NOT connected to any of my other stories. Just ... *deep breath* Okay. Lets see how I manage Thor. *twitches worriedly*

When JARVIS told him they had a visitor in the lab, with that calm, vaguely amused tone that meant it wasn't anyone to worry about, at least not in the trying-to-kill-him stakes, Tony hadn't been sure what to expect. 

Not Pepper, Pepper wasn't a 'visitor', by no definition was she ever a 'visitor'. Possibly Rhodey, Rhodey occupied some strange limbo classification in JARVIS' head, somewhere between the 'family', 'friend' and 'irresponsible jackass who shouldn't be allowed to sneeze unsupervised' categories (that last one was, aside from Rhodey, pretty much limited to Tony himself), and had done ever since he'd absconded with the War Machine armour and left Tony lying on the floor (JARVIS was a touch vindictive, okay? Live with it). It was possible that JARVIS might shorthand that to 'visitor'. So. Possibly Rhodey, but JARVIS just didn't _sound_ like he did when it was Rhodey.

Which left a surprisingly wide range of options, only some of them annoying, but nothing in those options prepared him for the sight of an Asgardian Thunder God, in full regalia and with a big, beaming smile, standing over a whirring Dummy, and brandishing a fist.

The only excuse Tony could offer for the verging-on-suicidal stupidity of what he did next was that the unexpectedness of it, combined with shock and a couple of protective instincts he hadn't really been aware he _had_ , pretty much short-circuited his brain. Which was why he'd picked up the nearest heavy object to hand (a _wrench_ , holy shit, could he have been any more cliched?) and, in the middle of darting forward to physically interpose himself between them, flung it straight at Thor's head.

He threw a _wrench_ at the God of Thunder's _head_. Because that was a thing sane people did. Absolutely.

"What is _wrong_ with you, what the _hell_ , go pick on someone your own size!"

Jesus, what the hell, was he _twelve_ , now?

Thor, lowering his arms from where he'd thrown them up in front of his face (not that he'd had to, not that a wrench thrown by a puny human would have done all _that_ much, although the shiner might have been fun), stared down at him, completely nonplussed. Dummy, behind him, made that high, agitated whirring noise that was his equivalent of 'dude, what the hell'. And JARVIS, lurking invisible around them, was suddenly so conspicuously silent that all Tony's 'you made an ass of yourself again, Pepper will be so disappointed' alarms started blaring.

Tony came down off the balls of his feet, feeling his shoulders loosen and his hands uncurl from their (completely unintentional) fists. He didn't move from between Thor and Dummy, not just yet, it was only paranoia until after the first six times they kicked you in the teeth, but he came down out of the stunned, vibrating defensiveness, and raised one hand to hold Thor off for a second, and the other to rub the bridge of his nose.

"JARVIS," he asked, slowly and heavily, "why do I suspect you did that on purpose?"

"I really couldn't say, sir," his oh-so-traitorous AI answered, completely deadpan and with not the slightest hint of humour. "It has been said that you have a naturally suspicious frame of mind."

Tony blinked slowly, lowering his hands. " _Who_ said that?" he asked, mildly curious, while Thor, two feet in front of him, looked between him and the ceiling, and actually made a pretty decent attempt not to visibly grin.

"Oh, a few people," JARVIS demurred, cheerfully. "Here or there. Once in a while. I really couldn't be more precise, sir."

Tony scoffed silently. "Oh, I'm sure you could, if you put your mind to it," he said, drily. "You know, you and me, we're really going to have to sit down and have a talk about your priorities one of these days. Oh buddy of mine."

"I look forward to it, sir," JARVIS said, promptly. And probably entirely seriously, the smug, invisible bastard. For some reason, those conversations always turned out to be fun for everyone but Tony.

But. Whatever. Back to the point. Tony focused back on the cause of his ire, feeling his shoulders start to gently lock up again as he glared up into Thor's bemused, faintly smiling face. Trying not to think too hard about the fact that Thor could go toe-to-toe with the Hulk when he wanted to, and Tony'd just thrown a wrench at his head. Which was, he decided, all JARVIS' fault.

"Hey, Beowulf," he opened, with the kind of grin Pepper told him not to use in business meetings, it was bad form to look like you were planning to disassemble the board, Tony, for God's sake put your teeth away. "Sorry about the whole wrench-to-the-head thing, no hard feelings, I presume you weren't actually trying to _hit Dummy in the head_ , absolutely not, right?"

Thor blinked, actually looking down at his fist, and then behind Tony to where Dummy was busy doing ... something. Conferring with JARVIS? Photobombing Tony? Something suspiciously silent, anyway. Thor blinked between them, Dummy and then Tony, and then ...

Then pure, genuine contrition flowed over that open face, a crinkle of real apology and a flash of true sorrow in those sucker-blue eyes, and _holy shit_ , they needed to weaponise that shit, they needed to get _right on that_. With some polish, and someone nice and sane and Pepper-like to stand beside him and ward off the inevitable losing-temper-hammer-time, Thor had the potential to be _devastating_ as a diplomat/apologist.

Not that it was going to cut any ice whatsoever if Thor'd actually been aiming to hurt Dummy but, you know, just a thing to note, yeah?

"Forgive me, my friend," Thor said, backing up a step from Tony, inclining his head apologetically. Which had Tony blinking at him, a bit, mostly because he hadn't been aware Thor could _do_ non-confrontational. "I had no intent to harm your family. I apologise if it seemed so to you."

Tony stared at him a little more. "Family?" he repeated, a little blankly. Then, more to the point: "Seemed so? You were pointing your _fist_ at him. I mean, at least it wasn't the hammer, but _still_. What was I _meant_ to think?"

He'd straightened, somewhere in the middle of that, stiffened to stand glaring up at Thor, and it wasn't that his chin was up, thank you, he did _not_ do that, it was just that Thor was something like eight feet tall, and had apparently decided that the best thing to do when someone was glaring at you was smile weirdly down at them (which, okay, Tony could get behind that as a tactic, worked a dream, actually, _stop smiling at him_ , thank you).

And weird was the word for it, there were ... way too many things in that smile, and in those blue eyes above it. Most of them sad. What the hell? Don't _do_ that, Tony got enough of that from Bruce.

"I am sorry," Thor said again, softly, like Tony was a skittish kid he needed to soothe. "I did not mean to alarm you." He smiled, soft and wistful and sad. "Dummy was showing me how to shake hands. I did not think how it would appear to you."

How to ...? Dummy was ...?

Okay. You know what? Restart level. Lets take that one from the top, boys and girls, and go back to the part where JARVIS said he had a visitor. Because, seriously ... the hell now?

"Dummy was teaching you how to shake hands," he repeated. Dubiously, hell yes. That was ... 

Except that, yes, that actually, in some strange, alternate-style universe, did make sense. Dummy didn't have hands the way most people had hands. Tony remembered, strangely vividly, those first few attempts, back in the MIT labs when he was a teenager, trying to teach Dummy about pressure differentials and appropriate care, and how to pick something up _carefully_ , and the strange sense of satisfaction and pride when three metal claws closed softly around his closed fist, and _didn't_ accidentally almost fracture two of his metacarpals.

Reaching up to curl his fingers around those claws in turn had come later, much later, long after Dummy had encoded 'gripping a closed fist' into his databanks as 'handshake, phase one'. It was ... It made a bizarre amount of sense for Dummy, in trying to teach someone else, to go back to the first part of the idea he had learned, and try to replicate it for someone else.

It made sense. It also, for some reason Tony wasn't completely sure of, made his throat close as though around a fist of its own.

"Indeed," Thor said, watching him closely, and there was something in Tony that sparked to vague anger, at the soft and ancient compassion in those guileless eyes, the strange sadness that had no source Tony could see. "He is a very patient teacher." A smile, absent and lopsided. "He would make a good brother."

... Ah. Ah, okay. Got that one, yes, he wasn't _actually_ an idiot, thank you.

Behind him, Dummy uncoiled, drawing himself up, and touched the tips of his claws to the back of Tony's wrist with a vague, questioning whir. Recognising, perhaps with some help from JARVIS, silent and watchful around them, that something had happened, that something had changed.

Though, maybe not with JARVIS, either. Dummy had always been ... weirdly good at recognising distress, when he sensed it. Not the causes, so much, beyond physical, pragmatic things, but Dummy had always ... had always been able to know when someone was in pain, near him.

Thor smiled, broader this time, and more real. "Forgive me, Dummy," he said, motioning as though to come forward again, with a glance at Tony as though for permission. 

Tony, nonplussed, nodded vaguely at him. Something. Hell, how would he know? 

Thor grimaced again, rueful apology, but came up beside Tony regardless. Carefully, as much because of Tony as Dummy, as though they were fragile things he needed to be cautious of. Hell. Maybe they _were_. He came up beside Tony, and gently held out a closed fist to Dummy, smiling faintly at the robot's worried, wary whir. 

"You have not caused me distress," he told Dummy, very gently, as metal claws closed with almost paranoid caution around his hand. Tony didn't twitch. Honestly, he didn't. "And it was not my intent to cause any to you, or your creator." He smiled, more deeply, and with a hint of mischief, maybe. "Though it pleases me to know that someone you value so highly would be so valiant in your defense."

Tony barely kept himself from flushing. Because no, and also, _fuck no_ , he hadn't blushed since he was _fourteen_ , but ... that ... _shit_. It was sneaky, and there was laughing in it, but when Thor said things, he said them so _seriously_ , all grave and weighty and earnest, and just ... What did you _do_ , with that? What the hell did you do with it?

Dummy, for his part, whirred agreeably, and much more cheerfully, increasing pressure on the two lower claws to nudge Thor's (potentially immovable) hand into following his claw gently up and down. Handshake, remember? Handshake, phase one.

 _Jesus_ , Tony couldn't ... He _couldn't_. Lets go back to the start, lets go back to the part of this day that made sense. Please, lets go back to the part that made sense.

"Indeed, sir," JARVIS spoke up, suddenly, and more gravely than Tony remembered him being in a while. "It has always ... pleased us to know that, too." A pause, as though to smile. "To know it, and to return it."

A soft, warm voice, wrapping itself invisibly around Tony, and Thor, looking up to listen to JARVIS, caught Tony's eyes. Caught Tony on the edges of the raw pain and soft grief in that suddenly ancient face, and smiled distantly as though he had found a precious thing, a thing he'd thought lost, and meant to see it safe.

"Yes," the Thunder God said, quietly. "A good thing, to have such things returned." 

To have someone have your back in turn, and not just to stab a knife in it as they spit on what you remembered had once been. Someone to value you in turn, so that you didn't have to look back on what you'd had, and wonder how much ... how much had ever been real.

How much that second father had ever really loved you. How much you had ever truly understood, of the brother who now hated you.

Tony swallowed, heavily. Swallowed, hard, around the fist still nestled in his throat. He swallowed down the memories, and the echoing grief in his own eyes. And then:

"Dummy," he said, softly. "Handshake, phase two, yeah?"

Dummy whirred, startlingly gentle, stopping the slow motion of his arm and, instead, tightening his claws gently around Thor's fist. Just a little, just for a second. Dummy couldn't damage Thor even if he wanted to. But he didn't know that, and held Thor as gently as if he were Tony.

Thor, blinking down at him, looked back at Tony, and raised an eyebrow. "Phase two?" he asked, mildly, and with humour creeping back over a grief that was far too honest and unashamed for Tony to bear. He tilted his head, blond hair swinging a little, and Tony found himself grinning faintly at him.

'Visitor'. Okay. Sure thing.

"Uncurl your fist," he instructed, moving closer just long enough to rest a finger on the back of Thor's hand, and keep his wrist still. "Gently. Open your hand, and grip the base of the claws, yeah?" 

Thor blinked at him, but complied, wrapping thick, cautious fingers around Dummy's claws, weaving his hand carefully into Dummy's. And ... holding. Soft, and faintly smiling, just for a second, while Dummy whirred encouragingly at him, like a proud teacher with a clever student.

 _Jesus_. Where did these people _come from_? Where the hell did they come from, that Tony could come home, and see this? Where did they come from, that this could _happen_?

"It is a pleasure to have met you," Thor said, with smiling sincerity, to the clawed robot who held his hand. "An honour to have met you, Dummy Son of Stark. And you, JARVIS."

Tony laughed, a shocked little burst, startled from him like a wrench to the head. Thor looked up at him, his wrist warm under Tony's fingers, the metal of Dummy's fingers cool beside them, and grinned, wide and cheerful as the sharing of a secret.

"Indeed, Master Odinsson," JARVIS agreed, soft and warm and amused. "And likewise, sir."

Shit. One of these days, life would go back to being the way Tony expected it to be, with things happening the way he expected them to. One of these days, his life would go back to being something approaching normal.

Grinning almost disbelievingly back, he really, _sincerely_ hoped that it wasn't for a long, long time to come.


End file.
